Lies of the Past
by Lured by the Song of Sirens
Summary: (ten years post-canon) The Black Organization fell before it could reel in its prize, but not before baiting the hook. Now a decade after its collapse, certain events and assumptions make the dangerous allure of what was promised seem possible to all the wrong people. The settled lives of past heroes and villains are disrupted alike as they soon find themselves with a common enemy.
1. Prologue (Kudo)

Dedicated to the question "Now how would that work?" and its fallout that culminated in the first of these stories and now its sequel. A continuation that I hadn't planned on, and then didn't think was going to be anything more than an idea, until I wrote it down, and by then it was too late. It's a novel now, or at least it will be.

So for those who thought they wanted to see the "Jellyfish Universe's" Gin and Sherry meet again and any other unfortunate reader along for the ride, I hope you're happy. As for why anyone thought putting their hopes of a happy ending in my hands was a good idea...honestly, that one still confuses me.

* * *

Prologue

[June: 3 Years Post-Canon]

Kudo Shinichi paced at the edge of a crime scene that the police were only just taping off, and winced preemptively as he dialed his childhood friend, Mouri Ran.

"Hey Ran, I've run into a case here. I don't think I'll make it back for lunch."

She had sent him out for a few odds and ends while she started the meal prep, but someone had been murdered just outside the little market he'd stepped into on his errand. He thought he had a fair grasp on who had done it, but he was still figuring out the trick the culprit had used to poison the victim.

"For crying out loud," Ran huffed. Kudo thought he heard the tempo of chopping increase on the other end of the line. Some poor vegetable was receiving the brunt of Ran's frustration. "Aren't we supposed to be meeting Shiho at your house in half an hour?

"Sorry," he offered. Haibara, as he still thought of her more often than not, would understand, though he would probably still receive an earful from her about it. "Would you mind receiving her there on your own?

"Shi-ni-chi," she over-enunciated his name in annoyance. "It's you she's come to see, isn't it? Three years is a long time not to meet up with a good friend.

"It hasn't been that long." He counted backward in his head, his eyes wandering over the display of square watermelons out front. "Just since the trials started. Let's see, the first one started in August of..." It was admittedly closer to three years than he wanted to acknowledge, but that wasn't entirely his fault. Between the first arrest of a black organization member and the final sentencing hearing for the case had spanned a grueling two years and eight months of his life.

The work of a detective didn't end with discovering the culprit, it didn't even end with an arrest. In fact, the other investigators they had needed to go to trial weren't even brought in until there was going to be a trial. Kudo had been called in to consult, to testify and to be cross-examined, to have his every action and deduction questioned, and then questioned again, and to endure the unending and international publicity of such a high-profile case.

The trials, like the investigation, and the arrests, had been caught between countries, and agencies within countries. However, by the end, they had done it as well as anyone could have hoped. The truth had been fought for and won out; the Organization had been ground to nothing; its members had been brought to justice

For all that time Kudo hadn't met with Shiho face to face. There had been the occasional brief phone call, but neither of them was the best at reaching out that way. Mostly he heard news of her through her sister Akemi, who he saw constantly during the trial years, but Shiho herself was taking time away from all the chaos. He hadn't even been able to get after her about pulling back from her friends because he was constantly hounded by the press she was avoiding. But the trials had been over for two months, and they were only now reconnecting.

He had trailed off in his thoughts.

"Please, Ran," he tried again. "I'll be there as soon as I solve this case."

"Alright," she said. "Be quick."

"I will," he promised.

And he had tried, but it was several hours before he was standing in front of the gate to his house, and fully dark. The poisoning turned out to be a case of involuntary manslaughter. The culprit had been the shop employee he had first suspected, but murder hadn't been her intention

The contact poison she'd rubbed on the square watermelons was only lethal when ingested. She figured square watermelons were too expensive to eat and hadn't thought anyone would ever actually eat one. Much less eat the rind. The fruit cost upwards of 10,000 yen and was used primarily for decoration.

The culprit knew that one of her coworkers never wore gloves like he was supposed to, and so she saw her opportunity to make him too sick to come to work.

Immediately after figuring this out, Kudo had seen the danger to anyone who had touched the poisoned watermelons during the day and gone on to eat something before properly washing their hands. That risk would be triply high for small children, who were more likely to touch the fruit in the first place, as well as to not thoroughly wash their hands before eating. Not to mention it would take a much smaller dose to make them seriously ill. To make a long afternoon short, it had caused him to be rather late.

The weight of the large iron gate slammed it closed behind him, the latch clanging loudly in the thick silence of the night. Almost immediately his front door swung open, and out stormed Shiho. He couldn't easily think of her as Haibara when he saw her in person. And now she was even older, even farther removed from the girl who had been his friend. Her posture was uncharacteristically off balance. He had read that sometimes people unconsciously kept their hands as if they were still carrying something they had recently put down. Shiho's shoulders were skewed slightly, like she was still countering for carrying a heavy weight on one side. He smiled and wondered how many clothes she must have packed in her travel bags

She met him half-way, her voice a harsh whisper

"Didn't you get Ran's texts?"

"No," he answered at a normal volume as he pulled out his phone.

She shushed him and gestured for him to come along with her. As they walked side by side back into the house he pulled up his messages from Ran. The latest of four texts from her had asked him not to make any loud noises when he got in.

"Why are we staying quiet? Where's Ran?" He asked as he read over the other messages.

"Wait, Haibara, do you..?"

He put it all together just as he came into the room where Ran waited on the couch, a small shape curled up against her chest.

"You have a kid!" He exclaimed, remembering at the last second that he had been asked to refrain from loud noises.

Shiho gave him a tired sort of look that was all Haibara.

"When did you...How old is she? You never even said you were seeing someone. Who-"

"Her name is Elaine," Shiho said, halting the near thousand questions he now had. "Elaine Miyano."

She had taken her mother's last name, did that mean her father wasn't in the picture? Was Elaine the real reason Shiho had all but disappeared for three years? Who was the father? Kudo had known of only one relationship in Shiho's life, but it couldn't be. _How old was Elaine?_

He had actually opened his mouth to ask this when Ran said, "She fell asleep in my lap." It brought him back to the present moment. The question of Elaine's father could wait. "I told them you weren't going to make it back at a reasonable hour but they insisted on waiting up for you."

Her voice was so gentle then, distracted by the little face she gazed down at. Even as she nagged him, it was like she forgot that was what she was doing. He couldn't help but smile at the image of Ran, utterly at peace with a small girl snuggled sleepily atop her chest. Everything about the moment was softness and warmth, and he wanted to hold onto it.

She looked up at him. Maybe when she realized he hadn't responded to her. But when she did the intent there changed, softened as she saw how he was watching her and little Elaine.

"She's beautiful isn't she," Ran said tracing the sleeping girl's round cheeks. "I just want to stay here holding her like this forever."

"Yeah," Kudo said blushing profusely and turning to the side in a bad attempt to hide it. "That would be alright with me."

...

Dinner had been postponed for Kudo, but the rich aroma of beef stewing was quick to bring it back to everyone's mind. Only after seeing the pot, and recalling that it was not what Ran had originally planned for tonight, did Kudo remember the groceries she had sent him out for in the first place.

"I forgot them," he admitted in a sort of swear as he entered the kitchen and saw the pot waiting for them on the table.

"Huh? What was that?" Ran asked distractedly as she tried to grab bowls for everyone with only one arm. The other supported a still sleeping Elaine who was wrapped around Ran like a koala.

"The groceries you needed." Kudo helped her get the bowls down and placed them on the table

"Oh, thank you."

"I ended up forgetting them afterward." He continued, "I'm sorry."

"It's all right," Ran said. She had more than half forgiven him even before his apology. "We managed. Didn't we?"

She addressed Shiho, who had fallen relatively silent and withdrawn in the past couple minutes of them talking, though she had still followed them to the kitchen.

"Yes," Shiho answered, caught slightly off guard by Ran's attempts to keep her included. "I should probably take her to bed so we can eat."

"Alright," Ran gave her up with a sigh, and Shiho soon disappeared down a hall with the sleeping toddler.

"Do you remember where- " Kudo started to call after her.

"Of course." She echoed back, not waiting for him to complete the question

Shiho out of sight, Ran turned a scowl at Kudo.

He answered her disapproval with a, "yes?"

Ran let out a breath, something between a sigh and a huff. "Shiho was probably really nervous to show us Elaine after all this time, don't you think?"

"Yeah"

"It was very brave of her."

"I suppose." He answered dumbly. Kudo didn't particularly like being led the same way he and Ran had grown accustomed to leading her father. The way they would point out something seemingly unrelated to the conclusion they meant Kogoro to come to, all with the intent of making him believe he figured it out himself.

Kudo strayed off-topic partly because of this, and partly because the mystery of it had resnagged his attention. "Was she waiting for the press from the trials to die down before revealing her, or did something else happen that changed her mind about keeping Elaine a secret? Might she have been hiding Elaine's existence from the Black Organization, or trying to avoid the public from associating Elaine and the Black Organization together? Maybe both. But why would she not tell any of her friends? Were we all too close to the trials...or?"

Shiho's steps creaked above as she started on her way back to them.

"Shinichi," Ran interrupted his runaway thoughts, her face formed now in a patient sort of smile at his musings. He couldn't resist a mystery; they both knew it. "Let's just try to make her feel welcome, okay?"

He nodded, and for that night at least he made an effort to keep prying questions to a minimum.

...

Still, the mystery of the hidden child and the unnamed father nagged at him. It was as he fell back into step with Shiho that week that his questions became more loaded, his comments more prying. It had been almost effortless to pick up their easy banter, and with that old comfort came less of a guard on what he asked her. She had been taking it in stride for a couple of days, batting aside his curiosity with her own jokes and remarks, before she had finally had enough.

It had been late in the evening, and it was what would be the last of a long string of entirely too direct questions on his part. She had been growing withdrawn and pale and he hadn't noticed. After the fact, he hated himself for not seeing how uncomfortable he'd made her that night. He'd been so focused on solving the puzzle of it, of uncovering the truth, he'd put his friend's welfare second.

He'd wanted to narrow down who Elaine's father might be; wanted to rule out some possibilities. She was never married, or if she had it didn't end well since she had no ring, or indent, or tan line to that effect. He thought she probably hadn't been widowed and had only meant to entirely rule it out. "Has Elaine met him, then?" Him meaning her father, and then, "could she even?"

"Stop!" She had circled in on herself, and immediately he felt a slap of guilt from where his curiosity had pushed her. "Leave it alone, please."

"I- I didn't mean to-" He struggled to say.

"Look, I know this is hard for you; I know this is probably the most interesting case you've had in a while. But this isn't something I want to have unearthed, Kudo. I need you to just let this be the one mystery you don't solve."

"Okay. I'm sorry, Haibara. I promise." He couldn't apologize fast enough. "I'll stop trying to solve your mystery."

"Thank you." She breathed relief. "Thank you."

* * *

Hey everyone! I'm back, and it only took me a year to decide to start something else.

Anywho, this will be a post-canon sequel to the pre-canon story "The Shared Past"

So you can expect to see scenes from several different perspectives as we go, and a shared continuity with that story.


	2. Chapter 1 (Elaine, & Kudo)

Chapter 1

[present/10 years post canon]

The cemetery wasn't like the ones she had seen in movies or back home. It didn't go on forever over grassy hills, where all of the rounded headstones stood in perfect lines, and were spaced out with enough room for each to breath. Just like everything else she'd seen in Japan since they'd gotten off the plane that morning, they were packed in close, pushed right up next to each other, but respectfully not quite touching.

Elaine followed her mom down the aisles of stone monuments. Each one was built up taller than she was, a stack of blocks that looked heavy and solid. She could almost imagine they were skyscrapers transformed magically into stone; that a whole city had been cursed to remain trapped here, frozen forever in the scale of a small garden.

There was a ritual for visiting a family grave in Japan, just like there was an important and solemn ritual for just about everything else. Elaine was only half paying attention as her mother explained what all she was doing. Through it all her mom kept that serious expression on her face; It was Elaine's least favorite of her mother's expressions. Was serious even an emotion? Could someone be feeling serious the same way they might be feeling happy or sad? It wasn't something Elaine wanted to find out for herself.

Eventually, it seemed like her mom ran out of things to do. She had stopped giving explanations a while ago. Elaine thought that her mom was going to be sad coming here, but she didn't seem like she was. Sometimes it took a while for adults to get sad. Maybe that was what she was doing now; waiting for the sadness to come. Elaine looked around while they waited and thought of the great stone city and what misfortune must have befallen it to be doomed to such a fate. The fantasy was somewhat broken when she saw a man pass by through the aisles of stone. He had been looking at her and her mother, but glanced away when she met his eye. She thought it was pretty unfriendly of him not to wave or something.

She turned her attention back up to the stone pillar where they waited. There was a family crest and a name in Kanji written there.

Elaine spoke Japanese just as easily as she spoke English, but she had been neglecting her Kanji studies. She knew it had to be a name, but she couldn't really read the characters. It wasn't Miyano, but other than that... She was drawing a blank.

"Should we go?" Her mother asked on an exhale before Elaine had the chance to ask what the characters said. The incense had burned out. That must have been why they were still waiting.

"What about that?" Elaine pointed to the black coat her mother had neatly folded over her arm. It was the only peculiar thing she had brought and hadn't explained. It wasn't even something they had bought when they arrived. Her mother already had it; although it was much too large for either of them, and Elaine had never seen it before this trip. "Aren't you going to leave that here too?"

"No," she smiled wistfully, "I don't think I can."

"It's not allowed?" Elaine asked, thinking it was yet another odd custom she was meant to learn.

"It's not that." Her mother said picking up the wooden bucket and ladle they had taken with them to the gravestone. "I've only decided not to."

"Okay," Elaine said, even if she didn't really get it.

It was odd that her mother had carried the coat all the way to Japan only to decide not to leave it where she had planned, but in the end, Elaine figured it wasn't any more odd than the other things she had done on this trip. She left with her mother, having entirely forgotten to ask how to say the name on the family gravestone they had visited.

...

The sunblock wasn't in the coat closet where Ran had said it should be. Automatically he walked to the old kitchen drawer where his parents used to keep it, but opening it only jostled the assortment of metal utensils within.

The Kudo manner looked nearly the same as it had in his youth, but he supposed this was because Ran had only been able to rearrange the small things so far.

He called up to where she was packing upstairs, "Where else could it be?"

She didn't give an answer so he started on his way toward her, figuring that she hadn't heard him, "Ran, it's not-"

He stopped short of the first stair, startled by the tall man who sat waiting on them. Akai made a quick gesture for silence to stop any startled outcry.

"What's wrong? Is Ran okay? What are you doing here?"

"She's fine, everything's fine. I just wanted to talk." Akai dismissed his slew of worried questions.

Everyone was planning to meet up in Hawaii on the following afternoon, so for Akai to have flown out here, alone, suggested urgency.

"Well?" Kudo prompted. "What couldn't wait eighteen hours?"

"Don't go and make it sound as pressing as all that; it's only, there's something I thought we should sort out before everyone is together."

"Okay," Kudo said. He thought of pointing out that it wasn't like _he_ was the one who'd given their conversation the weight of secrecy, but held back, waiting for Akai to go on.

"It's about Shiho mostly, about what she's been hiding. Maybe it's nothing, but I have this gut feeling-" Akai rubbed at the dark circles lining his eyes. Those circles had only grown more pronounced with each passing year. "Did you ever figure out who fathered Elaine?"

The question struck Kudo as if out of nowhere. "Shiho asked me not to early on."

"Sure, she was sensitive about it then, understandably." Akai didn't explicitly say that it was because Elaine was a child born out of wedlock but it was in his tone.

The Japanese stigma against this was severe, so much so that to his knowledge Shiho had not lived in Japan for any of Elaine's life. He felt the familiar protectiveness swell in his chest, as the whole of him prepared to come to his friend's defense if needed.

"But even still," Akai said, "you must have an idea."

"Why are you worrying about this now? Shiho is a private person; if she wants us to respect that I don't see why we should break trust after all this time."

Kudo started on his way back toward the coat closet. "Come on, so long as you're here you can help me think up places someone might stash a bottle of sunscreen." It had been a long time since Akai had lived at the Kudo manner, but there was little doubt in Kudo's mind that he would remember its general layout.

A closet and a half of searching later, the questions left over from their conversation nagged at him still. He was sitting on the floor so he could reach the bottom few shelves of one, and Akai stood opposite him rifling through the top few shelves of another. Finally, curiosity overcame him and he asked:

"Do you have a theory then; a reason to be concerned?"

They both stopped a moment to pass a knowing look between them.

"There is one distinct possibility," Akai left the suggestion hanging in the air. It was a sour thought, one neither of them wanted to be correct.

"No," Kudo said. It wasn't something that should not even be suggested without proof.

Akai turned back to their task, turning each of the spare bottles of bathroom products so their label faced forward. "The things Elaine has said; every time she mentions her father, it sounds strange. Sometimes she talks as if he is a part of her life, but she never mentions actual times that she's with him. Almost like he's some figure that's been built up in her imagination, but not someone she's met. Then I heard her talking to Akemi about why her parents aren't together, she said her mom didn't want people to see her differently because of who her father is, she wanted her to grow up with 'a normal childhood, and all that'."

"Something Shiho didn't get," Kudo interjected.

"I know, but still," Akai said as if his vague evidence could actually hold water.

"That's it? Having an odd relationship with her father doesn't mean that her father is-"

"You have to admit it's not impossible."

They had both stopped truly searching once more, their hands resting mid-task.

Kudo had about as much evidence to disprove Akai's wild claim as Akai did for it. The problem was he'd promised he wouldn't investigate the issue and so he hadn't.

"Akemi knows who it is, doesn't she?" He reasoned. "Don't you think that if it was him she'd be more concerned?"

"I can't speak for my wife." The statement was harsh, blunt, and Kudo guessed more than likely symptomatic of the true problem here. "If the truth was truly harmless I can't fathom why she hasn't just told me. Especially because she knows it bothers me like this. Shiho told Akemi from the very start, you know."

"So, they're sisters."

"They weren't that close before when they were in the Organization, but now-" Akai's scowl deepened. "It was three years after the fact before anyone else knew. Three years and Akemi had known from the moment Shiho found out she was pregnant."

"And?"

"Nothing, it's just, for all that time... To find out they could conceal something so monumental, for so long... and now with the question of Elaine's father; I can't trust that it's nothing."

"That's hardly a reason to think they're colluding. Shiho probably wasn't sure she was going to keep the child and was only minimizing the embarrassment if she did let her go; it's obvious why she would need her sister's, and only her sister's, support in that scenario."

"I was living with Akemi for the better part of those years." Akai rubbed at his stubble, and Kudo wondered absently if the man had become a less conscientious shaver with age, with time off work, or due to some other factor. "We spent nearly every moment in one another's company, and she hid Elaine's existence from me entirely. So when it comes to this-"

"You hid the fact that you were an FBI agent using her to get to a crime syndicate for the years you were dating."

Kudo had meant the remark to be jarring, something to shake him from his baseless mistrust. However, his stoic companion's eyes merely misted for a moment before he recovered.

"Not well," Akai admitted. "Besides that just makes matters worse. How can I expect transparency with this now, after what I did? It would only be fair for Akemi to keep her own secrets, even dangerous ones. Can you tell me with certainty that it's not possible they met up before that final raid? I know how you found her that day, clutching his unresponsive body; I don't doubt she loved him, once. Maybe even as much as she hated him."

"And if you are right? What does it matter?"

"Don't you think it would have changed how we handled everything with Shiho? With Gin?"

"No," Kudo said, unswayed. "We did what was needed. Even if she had made nice with him before the end. Even if Elaine is Gin's child, I don't regret our decision."

It was clear that Akai wasn't so sure of that decision anymore.

"You're not a father yet, so perhaps that is why you can remain so certain."

"Do you really think it would have been better for Elaine if we hadn't intervened?" Kudo asked harshly. "If that is the truth of things, isn't it better that we've all but undone it?"

"That's my worry exactly: That Gin would think that had been our intention if he were ever to find out the truth about Elaine. Can you imagine his reaction if he thought that deal was made to keep him not just from Shiho, but from his child?"

"He can't get to them, we made sure of-"

Kudo was cut off by the doorbell ringing, and both men hastened to answer it. But Ran must have been closer because they could hear her greeting someone before the door even came into sight.

Shiho's voice carried over with words of apology and something about her flight being diverted due to bad weather in Hawaii. Akai had talked over it somewhat as he whispered: "Don't tell her I was here." He started to back away from the entrance, and Kudo followed. "There is something else I'm afraid."

"Shinichi," Ran hollered to him, "where did you go?"

"Coming, Ran!"

"I'll try to be brief," Akai said nearly at the back door, "The FBI files on Gin have been classified. I'm not quite sure when, or why. But it means I don't know where he is, and not even my superior's superior has access codes that can declassify it."

"That doesn't-" He had meant to say '-make any sense,' but before he was given the chance a little girl with loose long black hair and more pent up energy than a shaken sodacan tumbled into the room dribbling a soccer ball artfully around walls and furniture, all the while calling for her 'Uncle Kudo.'

* * *

Author's note: Sorry for the wait. I've been fussing over this chapter for a while and although I'm not 100 percent pleased with it, I'm tired of being stuck on it because I'm anxious to get on with the rest of the story, sooooo hope its okay, please bear with me; I reserve the right to polish it later ;) Anywho, I'm posting chapter 2 at the same time as this (because I like it better *cough cough*) No really because I just have no patience and it's been done forever.


	3. Chapter 2 (Gin)

Author's note: Hey, I'm posting this chapter at the same time as the one before it. Please don't forget chapter 1 exists, thanks

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Chapter 2

Many considered themselves to be well past the danger after more than ten miles separated them from a neutralized target, but Gin did not count himself among their number. He kept pace with the flow of the street market's crowds, maintaining a distractible air that allowed him to remain entirely aware of his surroundings. He considered the wares of close to a dozen stalls, and carefully selected a fair bit more unbruised fruit than he would have time to eat before his unit pulled him out of this country. He bartered lazily and accepted a higher price than he thought a local would think fair before rejoining the crowd. All the while his coat remained firmly fastened, concealing his Beretta and the fine misting of blood on his shirt.

It was moments like this, that seemed so outwardly mundane, in which he thought of the FBI agents who had handed him that plea deal all those years ago. He wondered if they knew that they hadn't taken a killer off the streets as they intended; they had merely changed who he answered to. He doubted it. The Akai Shuichi he had known wouldn't have offered it to him if he had realized how easy it would make it for someone else to swoop in and arrange for him to disappear the rest of the way.

Officially, 'the man with the codename Gin' was dead to the public, and as far as the Japanese Government and the FBI were concerned he had been expedited to a state in the U.S. without capital punishment, in reward for his cooperation.

Of course, he had never made it there. It was almost intriguing how the different layers within a single government could lie and conceal information from each other so long as they had the authority to do so. All the different agencies and divisions, ranks and clearance levels, they made a great many screens to cover when those with power took what they wanted. Gin would have liked to say he was surprised where he ended up, in a position not unlike where he had started. But he wasn't. It aligned too well with a hard fact he'd faced since childhood; that old truth, upon which his life had been predicated.

The fact of the matter was Gin had a set of skills, and always there were those who would see him use it to their ends. Whether it was because the early shaping of him had left him unsuited for anything else or because the tool they'd shaped him to be was too valuable to be cast aside, the result was the same. Always, there were only two options, to use him, or to break him.

And so a weapon he had remained.

...

Gin made it back to the condo where he had taken up residence without incident. Still, his nerves were strung for action, a tension in his muscles remaining from the mission. He left the bag of fruit he was carrying on the counter, but even as he moved through the space he knew someone else was there

He had seen her out of the corner of his eye. No, even before that he had sensed her. She had been caught in his assassin trained wariness, before his sight confirmed. Perhaps in some combination of all the information his sleeping mind had shifted through and pressed together into an awareness of her. He spoke to that figure in the side of the room, not turning to her.

"Of all the ghosts from the past my mind could conjure, it figures that the one I least want to see is the one that has come to haunt me.

It would have been very like her to ignore the thought he had voiced, to pretend a welcome that was not between them. Instead, she responded to it. It made the first words he heard her say in nearly a decade sound remarkably unlike the woman he had known.

"The very least!" He was too out of practice to tell if she had truly been wounded. He didn't care either way. "Really? I can think of nearly a dozen ghosts from your past that would be more interested in killing you than talking to-

"And would wound me less." He cut her off, finally bothering to focus on her.

She was still trying to look offended, but her eyes gleamed with a little too much mischief to be convincing. Vermouth hadn't aged in ten years, not visibly, or at least not by much. He knew she wouldn't have, but it was still disconcerting. She probably looked noticeably younger than him now. Frozen the same way she had looked when he was just a child. Her skin untouched by the smile lines and wrinkles countless decades of smirking like a hunting cat should have earned her. Gin wondered if he would look older than his unaging father as well, if he were still alive.

Vermouth gave up her indignant pose. "I suppose it would be bad form to whine that you've maintained a healthy respect for my abilities.

"Bad form to forget an enemy," he let his voice go low and dangerous. He had stepped between her and the exit in their brief conversation. Vermouth glanced at the door and sighed at him, letting him know she wasn't particularly threatened by his childish advantage. She should have been. There was no Organization to stand between them; nothing to stop him from killing her as it had so many times before.

"I was hoping for allies, but enemies with a common purpose would suit just as well if it must."

Gin didn't immediately respond, not asking the questions she had set him up to ask. He let the silence extend between them, let the tense way both of them stood on either side of the sitting room punctuate his refusal to go along with this. She wanted him to do something for her, that's where this conversation was leading and they both knew it. Why else track him down after all this time?

He gave in to the inevitable. "So what is it? What's happened?"

"Something that is about to happen, rather. And once it does we'll have a catastrophe to contain."

"If it hasn't happened yet then just stop it before it does and leave me out of it." He was suddenly as tired of Vermouth's games and circling of the point as he had ever been, ten years was too short a time to be ready for more of it.

"I considered that, but I've never reveled in murdering children." He stiffened, if only because she said it as casually as she said everything else. "That's what it would take; kill one little girl and all my problems take care of themselves. But you won't want that and I came here out of consideration for you."

"What little girl?" He was nearly at a growl now. If Vermouth had ever been wise she would have taken his warning, but she only continued in her way, self-assured and venomous as always.

"I think you know. You've kept tabs on her since she was born, haven't you?" She read his response from a minute change in his expression and amended. "Or at least since you were able."

The cold read had irritated him, what it meant she knew about his situation in the last decade had irritated him, but all of that paled to his fury at who she meant she had considered killing. That implication brought his body to the very edge of furious action once more, like water just coming to boil.

"Elaine," Vermouth spoke her name aloud, for the sole purpose of confirming her suspicions with his reaction. "Sherry's daughter-"

His already heating anger erupted into action. A jab to her throat cut off her sentence, and she hardly had time to recover from the shock of it before he had spun her back against him into a choke hold. It was a choke to restrict her airway and not the flow of blood; she would not pass out quickly, nor painlessly.

She didn't struggle against him, nor had she utilized any of her many decades of experience in her defense. She had let his attack come, even if perhaps she hadn't anticipated the brutality of it. He found the reflection of her face on the mirror in front of them. She looked entirely too exasperated for someone in her position, the same way she had looked when he'd stepped between her and the door.

She thought she had information still, information he didn't know, that would stop him from ending her.

"- And yours. Some would say," she managed to wheeze out. He let his constricting hold on her throat loosen fractionally, but kept her pinned hard against him. She spoke with her quick inhale of breath. "That's the trouble, they think she's yours and Sherry's."

"It's a lie."

"But still the trouble."

With no small degree of irritation, Gin released her entirely and stepped back. She didn't drop to the floor, only stumbled forward a bit.

There was information she was hoarding then, more to this than she was going to let him know just then. He left her to find her feet again and retrieved a couple of glasses from the kitchen. A wineglass for her, a lowball for himself.

He had just started pouring when Vermouth took her seat at the table. She smiled when she saw the red wine, "Like old times huh?"

"Never could get you to explain a bloody thing until you had a drink in your hand." He said gruffly, still with a fair bit of dagger to his voice.

She shrugged, staring down at the wine she swirled around her glass. It was entirely too feline and graceful a gesture for someone who was being strangled a second ago.

"I can't say I don't prefer this version of your hospitality a lot better."

"And I prefer when you don't threaten me to get my help." Ice snapped in his glass as he poured amber liquid over it.

"I wasn't threatening you..."

Gin glared at her.

"Fine," she conceded. "But I wasn't lying. Elaine's existence creates problems, whether you admit she's your kid or not." The last she added as an aside, more into her glass than to him.

"She's not," he snarled.

Vermouth waved a hand in dismissal of the point, and it was enough to mollify him.

"More importantly," Gin said, "Who's the 'they' you've gotten this wearisome idea from, and why should it matter to them?"

She looked utterly disgusted with him for a moment, as if he had confirmed something horrible about himself that she hadn't believed to that point. "Who do you think? I haven't forgotten the Organization's goals, even if you have. It was formed for a reason. That doesn't go away just because it fell."

"You still mean to go after them. 'The ones who started this.'" It managed to surprise him, even if it shouldn't have. She was one of the long-lived children created in the original experiments. It was her revenge the Organization had meant to take, at least in part. Even if Gin had long suspected Vermouth of having her own agenda more often than not, in that area at least, he suspected her motivations had aligned with the Organization's own.

"You want me to help you do it. To go after them with you." He puzzled out, in a way that wasn't a question so much as a conclusion.

"I've been pursuing them, for the last decade. Alone. I was the only one left to continue the Organization's goals, or so I thought. Foolishly it seems. I thought you would help me if you were still around; I thought that loyalty you once owed meant something to you. Apparently not." It was a cheap tactic, so obvious a blow he stepped well back from it.

Calmly he responded, "It still doesn't add up. You're not here because you found out I'm alive. I suspect you've known that for a while. You've also avoided my question."

Vermouth took a long swallow of wine, then starred toward the door with dead eyes.

"Vermouth."

She gave a quick exhale at that naming that might have been a bitter laugh.

"Vermouth," he tried again. She was trying his patience now. "Why does Elaine's existence cause problems?" He demanded.

"Because it does!" It wasn't the graceful skirting of a topic he could meet with his familiar annoyance at her antics. It was desperate and blunt. It made him consider once more what sort of position she must be in to seek him out. What must she be facing to have thought this was a good idea? He couldn't even contemplate circumstances that would have drawn him to consider the reverse; very little could have brought him to seek her out after ten years.

"She causes problems, and it doesn't matter why because you're going to help me anyway." She was vicious and exacting in the way he had always known she was capable of just below the surface of her ever cutting smile. "I'm not the only threat to that child, but I am your only chance of stopping the others."


	4. Chapter 3 (Elaine, & Gin)

Chapter 3

"Uncle Kudo, hey Uncle Kudo," Elaine called out. Though she wasn't particularly focused on searching for him. Her eye was on the ball at her feet. Every couch and table was an enemy she must avoid in order to keep the ball from falling into their clutches. After a close encounter with a lamp, which had wobbled just a bit when it's base had reached out to steal the ball, she spotted her goalkeeper. "There you are! Think fast!"

She kicked the ball straight for the slightly open door behind him, figuring it was as good an endline as any. Kudo caught the soccer ball under a foot and let the door fall the rest of the way closed behind him. Then in one easy motion, he kicked the ball up into the air before him, bounced it once, twice, and then tucked it under an arm. Elaine had tried to imitate that before and found it much harder than Uncle Kudo made it look.

"Alright little striker, we should probably keep soccer an outside sport, don't you think?"

Elaine thought of responding that she obviously didn't. Instead, she said, "lots of soccer matches are played on indoor fields."

"That's true, but most living rooms aren't one of those."

"Neither are most backyards," she grumbled.

"I know of a public soccer field that's not too far," he said as he adjusted a lampshade that was crooked, and flattened a turned up corner of a rug. "If we hurry we might be able to get in some practice before it gets too dark."

"Well actually," Elaine drew out, gaining a near manic look to her eyes. "I was hoping you might take me somewhere else."

She leapt onto a couch in pursuit of him as he retraced her earlier path of disruption. Then further she climbed onto the armrest, her words firing off almost faster than comprehension as she went.

"You know all the tallest buildings in Tokyo, don't you? Mom said you would, but I thought you might not, because it isn't interesting enough to know off the top of your head."

"Elaine, maybe you shouldn't-"

"I mean, I think it's interesting cause I like looking at things from places that are _really_ high up. But, it's alright if you don't."

It was then that her mom entered the room, deep in conversation with Auntie Ran, but not so deep that Elaine thought she wouldn't notice the precarious way she was perched on the armrest of the couch. She slipped her feet out so she was only sitting on it, in a likely not-quick-enough save.

"I see you're already recruiting Uncle Kudo into your schemes," she said, not without the guilt-inducing look Elaine had expected. "Don't forget you have an early flight tomorrow."

"Does that mean no." Elaine pouted. "It's my only chance; We're not going to be here tomorrow night."

"That's up to Kudo." Her mom answered without looking at her. She was preoccupied adjusting and readjusting a pillow behind Ran's back, to Ran's polite protests and her mother's insistence.

"He has to be on that flight as well." She added.

She noticed it wasn't technically a no. More like a no her mom had delegated to someone else to tell her. It was permission enough for Elaine.

"Please, please would you take me!" she leaned forward on the armrest trying to catch Uncle Kudo's attention, and gave him her cheesiest smile.

"I'm not sure what I'm agreeing to here," Kudo said, looking to her mother. Elaine thought it was rather like he was passing the job of telling her no back to her mom. Maybe she could still intercept.

"To see the city lights!" She had leaned far enough off her perch that she slid off and dropped the few remaining inches to her feet. She darted a look at each of the adults in the room, but didn't think anyone had noticed her fumble.

"Elaine has a couple of online accounts where she likes to post pictures of places she's been."

" -But only a really specific kind." Elaine cut in.

"That's right," her mom smiled. "Did you want to take over, Sundrop?"

She shook her head vehemently; she'd only gotten excited.

As her mother continued to explain Elaine listened intently to make sure nothing vital was left out, nodding along. She did a decent job of covering all the most important bits of what it was, even if Elaine thought she might not have conveyed how impressive it was to have the sort of following that her online identity had.

Mid explanation, Elaine thought of her book and ran to get it from her backpack. She held it up to Kudo, figuring if anyone was going to appreciate a book it was him.

He read the title aloud, "Sam and Lacy's Practical Guide for Getting on the Roof - The Essentials of Urban Exploration." The book itself was overflowing with illustrations of the sort of places people went exploring and enough information on the hobby that Elaine hadn't even gotten to all of it yet.

"Yeah, I thought the title was probably just a joke or a trick, like how 'To Kill a Mocking Bird' doesn't say how you would really kill one. But there's a chapter called "rooftopping". That's chapter..." she flipped through several glossy book pages, "eight. See!"

"Ah and there's the culprit," her mom teased with obvious affection. "The book that started the obsession."

She scowled at this, but it wasn't the well-intentioned teasing that had soured her face. That wasn't really true, and her mom had to know that. Her dad had given her the book only after she had gotten into it. When she'd started posting pictures to her account _shoelace_charms_ it had really only been a way to brag to her friends back home.

Her dad always took her to really cool places, just the two of them; big empty soccer stadiums, ice rinks all to themselves, and bumper cars and go-carts where they were the only ones on the track. She'd made up the name Shoelace Charms because both her mom and her dad didn't want her to post pictures of faces, but she needed something to prove it was her to her friends. So she tied a few of the charms she got traveling to different places into her shoelaces, and now that was her signature.

"This is a pretty intense hobby for a girl your size." Kudo had paused on a full-page spread of a man suspended from a bar at the top of a cell tower with only one hand, the ground below him a distant blur.

"Isn't it cool!"

"Hmm maybe," he didn't sound convinced. "But, don't you think those heights are awfully scary?"

"It's okay if you're scared of heights; I can hold your hand if you need me to." She patted the top of his hand as if to reassure him.

"You know there are safer ways to get pictures of heights."

She heaved a sigh, he just didn't get it.

"And how many adventures have you avoided because there was a safer option, Mr. Detective?" Her mother stated. She would have sounded disinterested, were it not for the slightest of smirks on her lips.

"So you just want to visit the roof of a skyscraper, huh?" Kudo said.

Elaine, who had given up convincing him, perked up. "Really, you'll take me?"

"Why not, Ran and I have an old friend who just might be able to help us out."

Elaine squealed like the girl of only nine that she was, but conveniently forgot when it didn't suit her plans.

...

"I take it you didn't know she'd returned to Japan," Vermouth said. He knew exactly what her face would look like as she said it. It was why he stared so adamantly out the low-set airplane window. They weren't designed for someone of his height, but perhaps that was true for the plane as a whole. "She's been back what, only twice- no, th- four? Really, it's the fourth time she's been back? Interesting."

"Your other assets must be failing you if you're relying this much on cold reads." He sat up just a bit to relieve the pressure on his knees from the seat in front of him. "Ask me straight. I'll answer anything relevant to the job."

Ironically, the open invitation to ask questions silenced her. Gin enjoyed a moment of peace as the first island coasts stretched beneath them. The dying light of the day fled from the peaks of trees and skyscrapers alike. He hadn't been home since the Organization fell. An uncomfortable realization to be left alone with. Made even more so by how ill-fitting that word felt: home. What was he returning to then- a place too removed to still be called home to him- a place where he had left home behind...

Even Vermouth would be less unpleasant than such thoughts. He glanced her way. She was still deliberating, arms crossed, eyes fallen to an unfocused spot of the aisle. He gave up on her. He would fill the silence if she wouldn't.

"Sherry's visits to Japan, are they important somehow? I don't know why she's here now. So I can't answer that for you."

She may have been annoyed at him for interrupting her as she reordered her thoughts. Or maybe she only considered whether or not to divulge some information, because after a moment she pulled in breath to say:

"She visited your grave."

"My- what?"

"Your family's grave. She took Elaine to meet you there." She wasn't smirking; she wasn't waiting for his reaction. This wasn't an estimation. It wasn't digging. Why did that unsettle him so much more?

"I should've expected her to be so sentimental and so so very stupid."

"I don't understand," Gin said.

"She practically announced Elaine's parentage, taking her child to your family's gravestone. It's why they know, I'm sure."

"Why should that matter? The alleged child of a dead man, what could that possibly profit them? Except revenge, and you said that they didn't intend to kill her."

"They don't." She didn't elaborate, he hadn't expected her to. "This is all beside the point. Honoring your death is merely how Sherry brought Elaine to their attention. That's why it's relevant. They've been following her since then, and I'm led to believe they don't have the resources to identify Sherry and her child outside of who she was rather than who she is now."

 _She was led to believe?_ She didn't even trust her own information. "You really are slipping, aren't you?"

She didn't acknowledge his interruption, but he broke her resolve just a bit. He could hear it in her voice.

"We break their line of sight, we sever their only lead."

"That's awfully simplistic." He hated this, working with a partner who wasn't even trying to hide how much information she was hiding from him. That was only symptomatic of the true problem. She was off her game, it was all her intel, all her plan, and she was fraying at the edges.

Maybe if he could get his own intel, reassess, rework her plan. "How long do we have?"

"What?"

"Before they're likely to strike," He clarified. "How long do we have?"

"That's... hard to say." She tapped her fingers against an arm. "At this point, they may only be waiting for an opening."

...

The door handle to the roof access was cold, even through the edges of the jacket sleeve Elaine had used to grab it. It made her worry for a moment that the night air was going to be cold too, but after Kudo's friend Sonoko had unlocked it with her special badge, the wind that whooshed into her wasn't any colder than inside. It was even a little warm. Elaine scampered under where Kudo's arm held the door open, and out onto the roof.

She stopped just short of the railing that lined the rooftop and took in the city lights beyond. The dotted lines of skyscraper windows were something like how she thought of computer code; it made Tokyo look the picture of the tech advanced city she had built up in her mind.

"Elaine," Kudo called to her, "be careful, you shouldn't run up here."

"Oh, let her have her fun," Sonoko chided him, from where the both of them still stood near the door. "isn't it too early for you to be hover parenting already?"

He said something back, and Elaine picked up from his general tone that he seemed to get annoyed, but they were pretty far away and she didn't hear too much of what they had started arguing about. Well, to be honest, she sort of stopped listening, but there was also a lot of wind noise in her ears too, so even if she had she wouldn't have understood too much anyway.

She turned her back to them once more and focused her attention ahead of her, leaving the bickering adults downwind.

The city was an expanse of hazy lights before her, and also, it seemed, beneath her. Elaine wasn't scared of heights; she absolutely wasn't. But maybe her chest didn't know that the same way her head did. And her chest was proving the more passionate of the two at the moment. She sat down still two or three steps short of the roof's edge and scooted her way to the end of the rough concrete.

Once there, she kicked her feet to either side of a railing spindle and freely into the open air over the city in triumph.

Looking over the edge wasn't going to summon a great hand to push her over it. It wasn't. Or, at least it never had before.

Once there the restless wind snuffed about every inch of her in the way of all places well and truly high up. Like some massive beast taking her measure with its great snout and powerful nose.

She leaned forward.

Her heart moved to her throat.

The wrought iron in her grasp was so cold; it seemed for a moment her only tether.

Then she was in the air.

Just as she had pressed her face to either side of two spindles, a pair of hands scooped underneath her shoulders and swung her backwards entirely off the ground, startling her. Her ears caught up to a hoarse voice that must have been shouting before.

"Do you have any idea how dangerous that was!" Her uncle Kudo turned her about to face him.

Her heart beat like a trapped rabbit and she nearly burst into tears from him scaring her so bad all of a sudden.

"I- I was fine." She insisted, her own voice now breathless. "The rail isn't even that close to the edge. See." She gestured to the railing, which truly was a good foot and a half back from the roof's edge.

"You don't go past the railing, Elaine. Not even a little bit, even if you think it's not that close to the edge, or for any other reason." He still gripped both of her shoulders in his hands. He was so close, and his voice had gotten so loud. She wasn't nearly so scared of heights as she was of him just then. "The railing is there for your protection, okay?"

She nodded, more from the freight of being startled than in agreement.

He let out a long breath, like he hadn't really breathed in the last minute or so, and seemed to check her over for scraps.

"I told you I'm fine." She said to her feet. "My balance is really good. I take gymnastics you know." The whole reason was so she didn't hurt herself when she took pictures like she wanted, her mom had told her so.

"You don't have any fear, do you munchkin?" Sonoko crouched down to her level and grinned like it all might have been a good joke.

Elaine mustered a smile and shrugged.

"Knock it off." Sonoko swatted away Kudo's examination of her, which had actually turned up a few scratches on the back of her calves from when he'd pulled her over the rough corner of the roof. "I have a real physician on call, and you're just scaring her."

Kudo grumbled something about "...the idle rich calling in a doctor when a first aid kit would do," but otherwise seemed to listen to her.

"Oh," Sonoko grew excited, seemingly out of nowhere, "did you know that in this very tower there is an ice cream bar where _the_ Kaito KID once made an appearance!" Elaine didn't know what she was talking about really, but ice cream never sounded like a bad idea so she said:

"Really? At an ice cream bar here? Is it open?"

"It is for me," Sonoko led the way back into the building, chatting all the way, something about how this phantom thief KID person once 'allegedly' had a thing for her when she was in high school, though it was all ancient history now.

Elaine, still without any satisfactory pictures of her feet hanging over the view, gave a fleeting glance back at the roof as they filed away

* * *

Author's notes: Yeah so this is still an active project. I don't know whether to say surprise or sorry... I really do have so much planned for this story, thanks for bearing with me.

oh and to answer Velgamidragon: The entirely of The Shared Past is Canon with this story, but only as written. Anything you may have read between the lines is notably less canon. I think if you revisit that epilogue you'll find it does not claim Shiho has been married.


	5. Chapter 4 (Gin)

Chapter 4

The smell of freshly cut grass lingered in the air, more pungent than the fumes of jet fuel that mingled with it. Small airfields like this, private airfields, were often just stretches of grass long enough to land a plane. That's all it was, a clearing in the trees and a hangar. But that was where Gin waited. In the dark, on the outskirts of a field, watching. An unassuming location, if only at first glance. But, if it had truly been unimportant, it wouldn't have guards posted at the hangar and patrols circling its perimeter. Yakuza guards if Vermouth's information was worth half a damn.

Vermouth had probably been correct about this location if nothing else. It was private and secure, a good place for a mark to change hands. And for the same reasons, not the best place to try to intercept that transaction. But, it was what he had come to do all the same.

The patrol headed out from the hangar again, two men on foot with large flashlights who were doubtless armed more heavily than he could make out in the dark. Although, he was more concerned about their radios than any firepower they might be concealing. If they kept to the pattern of the other patrols, they would walk along the outer fence and return.

Gin lay low in the underbrush, just concealed behind the treeline. He was already within the fenced area, and he tried not to be too wary of the armed men slipping out of sight behind him. Another flashlight bobbed to life by the hangar, and started on its way not along the road to the outer gate but into the field. Towards Gin.

It was important not to move in situations like this. Instead, he watched his breathing, kept it steady, kept his heart rate down. That he'd been spotted was only a possibility, and if he moved now it could prove a certainty.

The flashlight veered off after it reached a certain point, turning sharply to its right. Gin measured its movements intently now. The light would bob and sway as before, with the man's steps. But then, it would drop, flash at the ground for a few paces as if searching. Then stop, go a bit wild for a second and continue. It fell into a pattern, so exact that the steps he took in each interval counted out the same with little margin for error.

His guess was that the man's flashlight went wild like that when he bent down, and the intervals were exact because he was laying out the edgelights of the runway. Each time he bent over he was staking in a light. They weren't on yet, obviously. But they wouldn't be if he was just setting them out. They were expecting a late arrival then, like Vermouth had said.

And so he waited. Waited for the plane with an enemy as old as any he had known to arrive. Waited for when they would come to collect Elaine from the team of Yakuza brutes they had contracted to steal her away. Waited to kill them.

The man in the field before him turned unexpectedly, after only about a hundred feet. He continued in his pattern, ducking every few paces, across the width of the runway. He went another hundred feet before turning again.

He couldn't be laying out the edgelights of the runway then. It had to be something else. Had the plan changed? Or, was Vermouth's intel completely wrong to begin with? What little information she'd been able to give him anyways.

A hundred by a hundred foot square. It would be the right size for a helicopter field landing, he supposed. But the significance of a chopper landing here was lost on him. Whether due to a change in plans or bad information from the start, he was certain of one thing, it was past time he acquired some information he could trust.

Gin kept low, slowly closing the distance between him and the man he'd been watching. He avoided catching the edges of the flashlight when it wandered, and approached from behind.

This would have to be timed well. If he alerted the guards to his presence he'd be caught out in an open field. He'd come far enough from cover now that they could kill him ten times over before he could get back to it.

Gin followed close enough to hear the occasional confirmation over the man's radio. Too static to make out at this distance. Still, it added one more variable.

"Go ahead." The man he'd been stalking answered into his handheld radio. It was clunky, and outdated, and would likely prove an utter pain to handle covertly.

"Yeah, you're good. I'm just about done here." He clipped the radio back to his belt and bent to stake another unlit bulb into the grass.

He'd been correct. It was the way the man swung out his flashlight arm when he bent over that made the light seem to go wild from a distance. An unfortunate quirk of his, because when he reached the next point, and his light went wild for just a second, nothing at all seemed amiss to the guards posted outside the hangar.

Gin lowered the man's body onto the grass, but held the flashlight steadily at waist level. There was very little he could do to prevent it from being discovered when those lights came on. He didn't expect his ruse to last until then anyways.

Ever mindful of how the flashlight would look back at the hangar, Gin completed setting out the ground lights. He counted out his steps, so the light shined ahead, at the ground, and swung out, all at the right times.

All the while he listened to the chatter over the radio, piecing together information: The chopper was coming to refuel before heading out. It had been unexpected, and the crew here weren't particularly prepared to service it, still it was being rushed; The timing of something important had been moved up; someone felt cheated because they weren't at the right place at the right time. That conversation had been moved to a private line; finally he got a location. A tower owned by the Suzuki Financial Group.

That's where the extraction would take place then.

Just as he started on his way back to the hangar, Gin heard the rumble of two car engines start up somewhere just beyond the clearing. He maintained his unhurried pace and was nearly back to the hangar when the flash of headlights came unto the field. They would be quickly approaching the landing site he knew. One pair of headlights for each of the front corners.

Good illumination of the site was important for landing a helicopter, though not so great news for him. He could hear the distant wiring of helicopter blades now as well. It wasn't more than seven miles away, maybe even as few as four. He had a lot less time than he had planned.

He shined his flashlight toward the guards' faces as he closed in on them, for the same reason helicopter landing sites are only lit from one side.

"Hey, knock it off!" The two guards at the entrance raised a hand to shield their eyes as he came closer.

They didn't see the gun hiding in the blind spot just behind the glare of the flashlight. They likely couldn't even separate Gin's shape from the darkness behind him. The burst of gunshots revealed him before their radios could, though that revelation was not long to follow.

After dropping the two posted outside the hangar, Gin pulled flush to the wall by its entrance. Their reaction time was actually fairly impressive. Three men, guns brandished poured from the doorway. Well they would have, if Gin hadn't cracked the dense metal handle of the flashlight across the knuckles of the first one, knocking his gun to the ground. Then shot over his lurched form into his companions.

The first shot had been fatal, the second wide, as the man it'd been intended for ducked out of the way.

The man, now doubled over in the doorway, rammed his shoulder into Gin, very nearly knocking him from his feet. As he was pushed backward, Gin snapped the flashlight up under the man's jaw. Something crunched savagely as it connected.

The third man, who still hadn't made it through the doorway, fired a shot off at Gin, but the angle was bad since his companion had pushed Gin back several feet. Gin grabbed the man with the bloodied face by the collar and hauled him up between him and the man on the other side of the steel doorway.

It was silent for a moment as both parties waited for the other to pop back around the wall and into range. Gin led with the bleeding man in a tight hold before him. He swung out quickly intending to draw his fire, which it did. Gin shot low, catching him in the leg. The man in his hold fell completely limp and he let him drop as he fired again at the man inside. Being shot in the leg proved an adequate distraction, and Gin was able to dispatch him cleanly this time.

The small office at the back of the hangar was otherwise empty. Gin made a quick sweep of the hangar and didn't find anyone else tucked away. A small aircraft or two, and supplies but nothing living.

That left the two who had gone on patrol, and whoever was driving the cars. It was possible they were the same individuals, but not certain. It was better to assume a minimum of four than to rely on the assumption of only two. If they were smart they would be holed up at the helicopter landing site. It was an easily defensible position, if only because the huge swaths of open ground all around it made it nearly impossible to approach them without being seen.

They would increase their numbers with whoever came in the helicopter as well. Or, they might stay there in order to defend them if they were important. No, it wasn't very likely that they would pursue after him, and he didn't have a good way of approaching them without getting picked off.

What were the odds that they would refuel and take off for Suzuki Tower without ever bothering with him? It might just depend on if they had the fuel with them in the cars. The whir of the helicopter had grown very loud now, goading him to make a decision.

"Anyone still alive in there?" The radio on his belt and another on the desk asked in unison.

Were they attempting to begin negotiations? Perhaps they did need the fuel tanks in the hangar then. He could play that to his advantage.

"Just one." Gin radioed back.

A long silence followed. Though Gin didn't wait idly through it. There were industrial tanks of aircraft fuel in here that just might prove a rather valuable commodity at the moment. It'd be worth his while to create some scarcity in the market.


	6. Chapter 5 (Elaine)

You've reached the beginning of the new chapters posted on 4/28. thank you and enjoy

* * *

Chapter 5

"I should have brought something to tie back my hair," Sonoko complained, confronted by a sufficiently reflective surface within the elevator. "Can you believe all that wind?"

Under normal circumstances, Elaine might have jumped to the wind's defense. But at that point she was just glad Sonoko had finally reached an end of the seemingly inexhaustible topic of a renowned, now retired, jewel thief her family had once been obsessed with challenging.

"It's to be expected on such a tall and square building." Kudo commented, "wind speeds increase with height, you know."

"Obviously I wouldn't know a random fact like that," Sonoko said, now intent on brushing her shoulder-length hair back behind her ears, with limited success. "I was told the wind wasn't supposed to pick up until late tomorrow morning besides."

"It's true then!" Elaine cut in, speaking over Sonoko somewhat. "High up places are windier!" She didn't often have her more whimsical observations confirmed by adults. It sparked such a burning curiosity in her she could hardly contain herself. She chased after Kudo as he exited the elevator, bombarding him with questions.

"Why? Why is that? And why's it matter that the building is square?" Elaine liked strong breezes; if the same wind just wasn't as powerful on a rounded building, she would have to avoid them.

"A couple of different reasons," Kudo put a finger to his chin and looked up at the ceiling "A decrease in both friction and density, plus there is the pressure gradient between warm and cool air to account for since it increases with height..."

She blinked up at him, still waiting for an answer she could make sense of. When he looked back down at her he realized just how far down he needed to look.

He smiled and began again. He held up one finger, "There is less friction further from the ground, things like trees and other buildings don't get in the way and slow it down."

He counted out a second finger. "Then there is the density of the air, in general, air closer to the ground is all pushed together, the little bits of air are like a bunch of people on a crowded street, it's harder to run through a crowded street than an empty one, right?"

Elaine nodded, imagining the bits of air like tiny puffy creatures that let out itty bitty squeaks when they bumped into the walls and each other.

"The final reason is a bit tougher..." he tapped a third finger pensively. "It has to do with what makes the wind in the first place. Wind is just air moving from high to low pressure; as you get higher there is a greater difference between the pressures of warmer and cooler air, thus stronger wind." Elaine was still nodding along as they walked, but he must have noticed her apparent epiphanies had become out of politeness rather than understanding because he asked. "Are you able to blow up a balloon?"

"Yes.."

"But you haven't always been able too, right?"

She shook her head, still not sure where he was going with this, or if she needed to be offended.

"It took a lot of effort, because you were trapping a bunch of air into a tiny balloon increasing the pressure. But what happens if you open up that balloon..? all the air comes blowing out. It didn't want to be crammed inside with all that other air, not when the air outside the balloon didn't have to be. Wind is like that. Sometimes, when it gets cold, the air in a certain place gets so pushed together that it pushes back more and more. It wants to move somewhere where its neighbors don't push back so much, but it's neighbors want to move there too. The wind is fastest when bits of air become jealous of how spread out their neighbors get to be. When their closest neighbors have it almost the same, they're slow about it. But when someone not that far away gets a lot more elbow room, that's when the wind really picks up."

"I guess I get it... it sounds like air just doesn't like crowds, like Uncle Shu. The air is always just trying to get away from all the other air..." She thought she understood it well enough, but had since lost interest. "Are we going to go back on the roof after this?"

The hesitation on both of their faces told her no, even if they had said yes she wouldn't believe them now. Uncle Kudo thought it was too dangerous, and his friend Sonoko thought it was too windy, and now this whole trip had been a waste.

"We'll have to see if there is still time after we clean up your scrapes and get our ice cream," Kudo said. "You still want to do that don't you?"

"I guess," she agreed, if only because she knew disagreeing wasn't going to change anything.

She was sure then that she'd lost her chance and it didn't take long for her to have her suspicions confirmed. It was about the same time the physician had just finished picking the rock and dirt from her injuries and started disinfecting them. It stung really bad, and she'd been so caught up in the pain that she hadn't noticed Sonoko had taken a phone call until she got back.

Actually what really got her attention was when Sonoko and Kudo started whispering behind her. It had been the window cleaners on the phone letting her know they were beginning to set up a system of horizontal lifelines on the upper levels of the roof- whatever that was. All Elaine knew was it meant they needed to stay out of the workers' way; smashing any remaining hope that she might be allowed up there again.

When it was finally time to go back up to the level with the ice cream bar Elaine's spirits were low, her patience for conversation was minimal, and her calves were so wrapped up in bandages that it looked like she was wearing shin-guards.

She didn't listen to whatever the adults had started discussing now; she didn't care.

She found herself unfairly annoyed at every employee they passed. Of course, cleaners for the main areas came out at night when they wouldn't be such a bother to everyone. Everyone except for Elaine. They didn't seem to mind Elaine's glares; well they didn't seem to notice. They always tucked out of the way before the three of them came by. She thought it was funny that she never caught any one of the cleaners looking at them, but somehow they always got out of their way in plenty of time.

There was a tall man ahead of them in a hall when they turned a corner once, and just the same her ducked into a doorway. She was closer that time and noticed that as he approached the door he bent slightly down, kind of like he was bowing to the wall. It was only as something in front of him flashed briefly green before the door opened that Elaine realized he had a lanyard around his neck and a black card hanging there; _just like Sonoko's special badge!_

The door closed behind him just before they reached that point in the hallway of course, but the man had given Elaine an idea. A pretty naughty idea, if she was being honest.

It would be fine. She'd take her pictures and return Sonoko's badge before she would even notice, probably. Hopefully.

But how was she going to get it?

Sonoko didn't wear lanyards. She'd mentioned that on their way up to the roof. Well, more like she had declared it. She'd gone off about how it wasn't fashionable or becoming a woman of her age, and that it made her look like she worked there, so people would stop to bother her with questions. She was the building manager, of course, so she did technically work there. It had been kind of a tangent, something she did a lot in Elaine's experience. Her special badge was in her clutch purse, that was what was important.

She thought she might be able to reach in when Sonoko tucked the purse under her arm, something she often did whenever she stopped walking a moment. A lot of the purse stuck out behind her where she wouldn't have a good view of it.

The problem was Uncle Kudo, he noticed everything. She never got away with anything when he was around, more than Uncle Shu, and even her mom. Kudo was usually more fun than Uncle Shu though, if only because he played soccer and had answers for some of her more unusual questions.

Maybe she could use that, if he was busy answering her question, he might not notice her take the badge from Sonoko. They were coming up on an elevator; it was just the time to put her plan to the test.

What had Sonoko and Uncle Kudo been talking about? She wasn't sure, but Kudo had his thinking face on, like a dog on a scent. Neither one of them was talking anymore since Kudo was caught up puzzling about something so she didn't have anything to latch onto. She would just have to use one of her unanswered questions from earlier.

"Hey wait a minute." She stopped in her tracks for dramatic effect. "What about the building, you said it's windier cause it's square right?"

"Hmm, your right I didn't answer that did I?" She got him talking just as they reached the button to call the elevator.

 _Yes_ , that was perfect. They were all stopped now, and Sonoko even tucked her purse under an arm.

"That has to do with the air pushing together again. When the wind hits the flat side of the building it doesn't know where to go, it has to go somewhere. It can't pass through, or go the way it was going, so it builds up that pressure, that push-" Kudo kept on talking, but Elaine was only focused on the badge sitting in the purse in front of her. But this was no good. His eyes were on her, making sure she understood his explanation. This was even worse than if she hadn't asked him a question at all. "- so it goes up, and down, and to the sides, all equally because no direction was easier to go than the others, they all took the same amount of push. If the building were more round, the sides would take a lot less push than up and down, so most of the wind could go around without building up so much."

After pretending to think about it for a second, Elaine declared, "They should only build square buildings from now on then."

This sparked a look of concern from Kudo, and she wondered if she should have listened more to his explanation.

"Square buildings actually can cause problems for the people on the street, since the downdraft can make the wind on ground level much stronger."

"But I like stronger wind," she complained.

"You wouldn't if it knocked you down or caused a car accident."

"Yeah.." she said, even though she still liked the wind from square buildings better. She didn't understand why people built them if they were causing all those sorts of problems anyways.

The elevator doors opened and Elaine realized her chance. Everyone always faced toward the door in elevators, right? And would be close to each other. If she stood in the back she could reach into Sonoko's bag without anyone noticing.

The doors opened and Elaine darted to the back and turned about, the wall rail behind her, Sonoko and her bag before her. Kudo came in as well and pressed a button. Now was her chance. Doors closing, heart pulsing so hard she could feel it in her fingertips, Elaine inched even closer to Sonoko. She darted a look at Kudo, one at the slightly open purse, another to Sonoko. It was so quiet, just the whirr of the elevator moving floors. She just had to reach out and take it. It would be right on top. Just reach out. Just reach- Dizziness swayed her as the elevator came to their floor. She still hadn't reached for it. Another glance at Kudo. The doors were opening. She- she couldn't do it. Was she sweating? Her skin felt clammy.

She exited the elevator feeling guilty and all fuzzy. She hadn't even tried and she still felt awful.

Dejected, Elaine trailed after her guardians as they came to what Sonoko proclaimed to be their destination. Sonoko gestured wildly with her hands like she was just learning a floor routine she wasn't comfortable with. The room was dark and empty so her introduction of it didn't amount to much. Elaine didn't share in Sonoko's exuberance, and even entertained the thought, if only for a moment, that she was entirely too sullen to properly enjoy icecream.

But then Sonoko had flipped on the lights, just for her. That was always one of her favorite parts: when the lights of a big empty space came on. The larger and more grand the place the longer it took all the lights to come on. It was always such a spectacle, coming on in stages as if to say "look here, no look here! And here!" All of it some big welcome because she had arrived. For a moment, she forgot her guilt from her failed plan, and took in the room.

It was the grandest place meant just for serving ice cream she had ever even conceived. All the furnishings were marble and sleek and there were pillars that came down into the room just for decoration, and a big round counter in the center.

"All this is for ice cream?"

"It used to be a lounge and display room, but was repurposed when Kid famously ordered a 'straight-up road, hold the rocks,'" she deepened her voice and leaned cooly back against the bar as she quoted him then burst out laughing at her own impression. "They renamed it 'Neat Ice Cream' and now it specializes in floats and has an all nut-less selection of ice creams churned in house."

Sonoko did seem prone to random fits of laughter, but that felt like she was telling a joke. She didn't get whatever it was and decided to move on so that wouldn't be obvious.

"What's the best one?" she asked, resolving to pick whichever sounded the weirdest, unless Sonoko would let her have a taste of each one in order to decide.

She was all caught up in the possibilities of it all that she barely noticed when Kudo excused himself for a minute. In fact, she was half-way through a plot to convince Sonoko she needed to taste each flavor, in combination with each other flavor, before she realized the opportunity that opened now that Kudo had left.

Sonoko was bending down to scoop ice cream every couple of seconds, and her purse was sitting on the counter in front of Elaine unguarded. Without Kudo there to watch her, she easily slipped the black security card from Sonoko's purse and into her pocket. When Sonoko straightened back up to hand Elaine yet another sample, she was still none the wiser. It was entirely too easy. Even still, her heartbeat just as much as before, maybe more now that she had actually done it.

Kudo still wasn't back when she excused herself to the restroom, and it was a good thing he wasn't because she was certain he'd figure out what she had done just by looking at her face.


	7. Chapter 6 (Gin)

This chapter was posted in conjunction with chapters 5 and 7.

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Chapter 6

To the untrained eye, the Yakuza operations in this aircraft hangar might have seemed pitiful. An ineffectual cog in their machine that remained fully staffed despite running next to no inventory. In truth, a barebones hanger was merely a sign of their preparation for this extraction.

Whatever business this airfield typically saw would have been altered, rerouted or halted so the lines of their operation didn't cross. It might have been different at the height of the Yakuza's power, but now the assets of a whole corporation could be frozen if just one part were snagged by law enforcement. The return from running both at once was dwarfed by the risk of associating the two. When it came down to it, they could only afford to run one line of their operation at a time, and so tonight, the only contraband they intended to run through here was Elaine.

It had left him with relatively little to work with in the way of supplies. He'd have to make do with what little remained and what he already had prepared.

Not a full minute had passed before they broke the radio silence.

"You've got some balls, I'll give you that."

It was a new voice this time, and Gin guessed he now conversed with the highest authority available within their present ranks. Or, at the very least, their highest authority left. He wondered if his new opponents had wasted that minute deciding who was in charge, or if they'd spent it more wisely organizing a strategy.

"Still, I'm curious how you picture this ending for yourself," the new voice continued.

"Should we skip right to a negotiation of terms then?" Gin intentionally misinterpreted his meaning, giving the man an easy opportunity to rush through this.

They were in a hurry, and Gin had something they needed. Those two facts were indisputable. The only question then was how they would go about getting it from him.

"You've killed all our men, your hostages, not a great negotiation strategy." The man gave in answer. Gin, whose hands were too preoccupied to answer the radio besides, let the man's predictable stall sit. "You don't agree?"

"You don't need men." Gin didn't stop his task to answer, haphazardly holding the button down on the side of the radio even as he hefted a load. His grunts punctuating his statements. "You need fuel." He thunked a tank solidly for good measure before releasing the button.

"You would sell us our own fuel?"

Gin looked over his work, now completed, and tried not to grin too much as he said, "Sell it back, yes."

"It's a hell of a plan. Ransoming fuel you haven't even stolen."

"If you think it's still yours, come get it." He goaded somewhat recklessly. Gin had, by that point, exited the hanger. If they had entered at that moment exactly, they likely could have done just that. There was little else preventing them from doing so than the bravado of his bluff.

"You'd like that, right?"

Gin was careful to only allow sound to pass through the radio in his hand when he spoke now. He'd left the other radio back in the hanger of course, sitting on the barrels of fuel echoing their conversation about from where he'd let them assume he was waiting for them.

"It would suit me just fine. It's your remaining men who I think might find it disagreeable. But it doesn't have to be that way, how about as a show of good faith I flip on those edge lights for you. No one would profit if your chopper couldn't land here after all."

"Do what you will," Gin's opponent responded with false resignation. "I could hardly stop you."

"What's the problem? Finding you have a finite number of men?"

"More than you have," he countered.

"True enough," Gin said, as he reached the place where he had disconnected a juncture in the extension cord before. Originally, this had been to eliminate any possibility those edge lights might come on while he was sneaking up on the man who was setting them out. Circumstances had changed and reconnecting them now would help solidify his misdirection. The only problem being the location, between the first of the edge lights and the hangar door. Perhaps seven or eight seconds of hard sprinting from the closest treeline. A location where the lights from the landing site would reveal his shape when they came on, undoubtedly.

He might have been able to lie close enough to the ground that they wouldn't be able to make him out in the dark. But he wouldn't have the time to inch along the grass and make his slow way to cover.

The blades of the approaching helicopter had come to slowly dominate all sound in the area as it closed in. He'd have to risk the whole ploy, or it would all be for naught.

Supposing they'd bought his ruse to that point, they wouldn't be looking for him so far outside the hangar. It was a rather thin layer of protection to have between him and gunfire, but he didn't have the luxury of another. Gin prepared for the dash, held the radio and extension cord at the ready, and willed his voice to embody an overconfidence he did not feel.

"I still wouldn't bet on your odds."

"No?" A small voice shrilled an answer against the thunder of the chopper overhead, even as Gin was well on his way toward the treeline. "What advantage could you possibly hope to press? I'm still trying to work out how you plan to profit from this ridiculous holdup."

Their conversation stalled just a moment as the helicopter came to land, Gin reached the treeline, and the cut of the blades finally slowed. He slackened his pace but didn't stop. There was still a ways to go, and he needed to ration out his stamina.

Even so, he took a moment to still his breathing, resume the illusion he was relaxed, and speak into the radio.

"There's always a profit to be made off of desperation. And your lot reeks of it." That had been theatrical and he knew it. Although it was only as overacted as this entire pointless exchange.

"Who are you?"

"I imagine introductions will play very little bearing on these negotiations."

"What negotiations? You don't have anything to negotiate with."

He wondered if the man on the other end had realized yet just how much stalling Gin had been party to, or if he still thought he was in control of the situation.

"Am I not staring down a pair of two-seater propeller planes?" He wasn't; he was lying under a tree where he had stashed a very long, very beautiful rifle that had played a much larger role in the original plans for this evening. Still, Gin recalled his earlier appraisal of those planes in the hangar. "They probably work nicely for smuggling contraband overseas. Risky though, cruising close enough to the water that you're off radar."

"And how exactly do you plan on stealing them?"

"Don't be ridiculous. I've no intention of _stealing_ the planes."

He expected the man understood his meaning right about the time flames licked up around the remaining tanks of jet fuel. The resulting burst illuminated the field outside the hangar just long enough for him to make out where two shapes had been flanking the hangar's exit.

So they had sent men for him after all.

He watched as they got their feet back underneath themselves, and waited till they fully caught the light. A rifle firing here, in this open of a field, gave such a loud and sharp crack it was like the sky itself split with each shot. He doubted anyone here had mistaken the sound of it.

He maimed the men outside of the hanger door, only aiming to take them out of the fight. No more, no less. He intended to cripple their operations, not to utterly decimate them. Although it sat well within his power to do so from this position. The helicopter landing site had flooded with light since he had last passed through it, and very little of it remained out of range of his scope.

What had seemed a daunting location to approach on foot had shifted into a location that afforded precious little cover to its occupants. A fact with which they were just now coming to terms; Their realization clear in the silence that followed the shots.

"I think we can do away with false pretenses now." Gin called over the radio, doing anything but just that. "I am in possession of enough fuel to get that helicopter of yours to Suzuki Tower and back, and only enough fuel to do so. As you are in dire need of just that. Surely, we can come to some arrangement."

"Bastard." The man on the other line spat.

Gin grinned at that. "So," he began once again, "terms."


	8. Chapter 7 (Elaine)

Hey, posting this at the same time as chapters 5 & 6, if the last thing you remember is Gin by himself in an airplane hanger littered with bodies, please go back. Thanks. If you didn't remember that either, I'm sorry- kinda spoilers.

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Chapter 7

Elaine waved the card over the reader next to the exit, heard a little chirp, and tried for the door. The handle would rotate, but the door wouldn't budge. Thinking she hadn't gotten to it fast enough she tried again. And again the door remained locked. She glared at the little card reader as she went to scan yet again, noticing the words flashed from a green 'Ready' to a green 'Enter Pin.' Upon further inspection the panel below the words swung out, revealing a number pad.

She hadn't even noticed anyone entering a pin before. Although, they had always stood between her and the card reader when they opened the door.

In a last futile effort, she stretched herself with one arm holding the handle down, and the other just reaching the box. Maybe she could trick it. She waved the card, heard a chirp, and then-

"What are you doing?"

She jumped back several paces, nearly dropping Sonoko's special badge. She also may have shrieked, a little.

Hand holding in her heart which had just tried to escape, she realized it had just been another kid. No way was he even in high school.

"I'm trying to get back outside, but the stupid door won't budge." She grumbled, yanking on the handle to illustrate her point.

He crinkled his forehead at her and her explanation. Maybe he was a bit older than Elaine thought before; he was about half a head taller than her even if his voice didn't sound older. Nervously, she eyed the odd straps he wore over a violently neon-green sweatshirt. She'd mistaken the straps as a backpack before, but now noticed they wrapped around each of his legs as well.

"Do you work here?"

"Kinda," he reached to rub at the back of his neck, only to realize he was holding some sort of round metal clips in his hand. "My older brothers are here servicing the windows; I'm just helping." He seemed to catch himself then as he looked at the items in his hand, suddenly bowing and speaking more formally. "I'm terribly sorry to have startled you, Miss."

"It's no big deal," she answered, thinking she may have just avoided trouble after all. "You look busy so I'm just gonna go-."

"Don't you want help opening the door?" He asked, dropping the deferential language just as quickly as he'd picked it up.

"But it's not working," she mumbled, skirting the fact that she really shouldn't be able to get through the door.

"Hmm, well if you've forgotten your code usually these things have a bypass. Like if you punch in one number a bunch of times."

"Really?" she perked up.

"Here, try it again."

She scanned Sonoko's badge once more and waited as the boy pressed zero a bunch of times. Sure enough, the card reader flashed green and Elaine was able to pull open the door.

"No way!" She ran through, not believing her luck.

This was a different side of the building, but the city still thrummed with the energy and color that made it seem so alive. She imagined the city as a hundred bonfires worth of electricity that she could feel by merely standing close to it.

It would buzz against just the side of her that faced the view, most intense on her exposed face and hands. She took in that imaginary sensation along with the brush of the wind and sighed in bliss.

Her nose was tickled a bit by a smell like candy; it seemed like something make-believe but wasn't.

"So, why did you need to get out here anyway?" That boy's voice asked from behind her. She spun about, finding he had come through the door as well. The metal clips in his hand before had been replaced with something small and plastic. He brought the kazoo like object to his lips, then blew out a cloud of smoke. That was the sweet smell, like a big puff of candy smoke.

She scrunched her face up and thought about scolding him for being way too young for that sort of thing. But maybe she didn't really have room to talk; she probably shouldn't mention when other people did bad things when she was just as guilty. He noticed her grimace and tucked the smoke kazoo back into his pants pocket with a shrug.

"Well if you're not sneaking off to smoke then I don't get it."

"I'm not sneaking at all!" She protested.

"Guess I owe you an apology then, Ms. Suzuki. I must have got it wrong." He bowed again, but when he straightened out he was grinning wildly.

The confusion on her face turned to embarrassment as he offered Sonoko's badge back to her.

"I'm sorry," she shuffled her feet under the pressure of his grin. "I didn't mean to lie. I wanted to come out here to take pictures of the view."

"Seriously?" He let out such a laugh that it must have come all the way from his toes. "That's a lot of trouble for just that."

"So what, it's important!" She turned sharply on her heel and walked further along the guardrail, away from him.

She wasn't even going to look back until she heard some weird metal clanking sounds. When she did turn back he was pulling himself up on top of the metal guard rail. He hadn't even hesitated.

"Don't you know that's dangerous?" She started reprimanding him without even thinking about it this time. "You need to get down from there."

"But, Ms. Suzuki I can't do that- whoa, just yet," he glanced down at her as he spread his arms out, his smile just as uncertain as his footing.

"That's not even my name!"

He wobbled to the right but caught himself. It hurt to watch; each time he nearly lost his balance her chest scrunched up like a fist.

"Okay, Ms. Not Suzuki. I still can't come down yet-"

"Yes, you can!" Elaine shouted the obvious, trying to figure out how she had gotten herself into this. If anything bad happened to him it would be her fault. She shouldn't have been so careless to leave the door open behind her; she shouldn't have snuck off; she shouldn't have even taken Sonoko's security badge in the first place. Knowing all that wasn't helping anything, yelling wasn't either but that didn't stop her from repeating herself. "Get down."

"Nooo," he drew out, "you're supposed to ask 'Why not?'"

"-aargh! Fine. Why not?" Elaine huffed.

"Because-" his voice wavered once again, and his uncertain smile turned to her as if seeking reassurance. She had no faith at all in his ability to keep from plummeting to his death; a fact she wasn't even trying to hide from her expression. "I have to make it up to you, for laughing about the pictures. So I thought I'd give you something interesting to put in them. You went through all the trouble of getting out here, the pictures should be worth it."

She was so stupidly nervous that all she could think about was how horrible his form was, and how he wasn't coordinated enough to be up there, and how he had leapt into this anyways.

It came out as, "That's stupid." And then, "you should get down now."

"C'mon please." He still didn't relent. "Let me make amends. The longer you argue the more time I'll be up here- feeling like an ass."

"Fine," she said. Her hands trembled as she bent to unclip a few of the charms from her shoelaces and hook them together, "but if you do this again I'll- push you over myself."

She meant to sound snarky, like she wasn't at all worried, but only sounded small. Even to her own ears. He was the fearless one, jumping atop the rail at a whim. She was just the girl who'd had to scoot her way to the edge.

She dangled her charms over the top corner of the frame and snapped a few shots of his stupid wobbly legs and his utter lack of core strength before announcing, "I've got them."

He hopped down, and Elaine finally let go of the ball of worry she'd been twining somewhere deep in her stomach. She braced her hands on her knees as she waited for it all to settle.

"Wow, that was crazy!" He exhaled on an entirely different kind of rush than Elaine was settling down from.

"That was awful." She shoved him.

She couldn't remember planning to shove him; One second he was stepping out in front of her, exclaiming about how cool he thought he was, and the next thing she knew she had pushed him and her voice had raised an octave or two. _Did her lungs burn like she had been running or was that only in her head?_ Her ears were strangely warm too. _Why did he have to be such an idiot?_

She hadn't shoved him very far, but he'd backed up a step or two on his own as well, only to come to a hard stop as he reached the end of a line.

"I wasn't in any danger, see?" He turned a bit, looking over his shoulder in a fruitless attempt to see his own back. She hadn't noticed the scrunchy cable that ran from the harness at his back to a bar on the rail until now. It connected to each with metal clips just like the ones she'd seen him holding; he unhooked them both now and stashed the short length of cable in the pouch of this sweatshirt.

"That wasn't a very nice prank," She reprimanded, no longer caring if it was the appropriate thing to do. "I was really scared for you."

"Really?" His voice cracked in genuine surprise. "Ah, I mean. But you don't even know me."

He lowered his voice in a way that brought to mind how Sonoko had lowered hers to imitate that thief she talked so much about.

"Well, whose fault is that? You're the one who got all caught up in my business with your 'What are you doing?'s and following me out here." Elaine said, growing huffy. "You never even introduced yourself."

"It's Touma."

"Well, I think you're a bully and a show-off, Touma." She swiped through the pictures she'd taken. She hated to admit they were really pretty cool. A boy silhouetted against all those city lights. The danger, the heights, the atmosphere; it was exactly the type of photo she liked best. She wasn't about to admit it to Touma. Without saying anything else she turned and started walking away.

"Aren't you going to introduce yourself?" he asked, trailing after her yet again.

"No," she shook her head, and pointedly didn't look his way.

"Well, can't you at least show me the pictures you took?" He held out his hand and she pretended not to notice. "How do I really know you took them if you won't show me?"

"Because I did." She kept walking.

"Then prove it. Unless you can't since you're just lying again."

She groaned, "I'm not." She pulled up one of the shots and shoved her arm out to show him.

"Cool! Guess you were right about the view. Is there just the one?"

She held back a scoff at his lack of faith in her professionalism. "No, of course not. There's- hey!"

Elaine had been pocketing her string of charms so she could scroll through the pictures for Touma when he'd snatched her phone. "Give it back."

"I will- just," he held her at arm's length, her phone far behind him in his other hand. "Tell me your name first."

"No way I'm giving it to you now, bully." She didn't give any warning before stepping on his foot and lunging again for her phone.

It tripped him and he staggered back, but his arms were just too much longer than hers. Between her reaching and his pulling away, they stumbled into a chase. Soon they were running, rounding corners, tramping up a set of metal stairs to another level of the roof.

All the while names were slung back and forth; he was a no-good bully; she was violent; he was a jerk; she was a liar; he was a thief; but so was she.

Their clambering halted at that. He'd turned about at the top of the metal staircase, and she stopped short of him. _She_ had stolen the security badge in the first place, and lied about it, and shoved Touma just for showing off.

She was right before, it didn't feel right to call Touma out when she wasn't any better. She had just started to piece together the words for a very difficult apology when a stranger came up behind Touma at the top of the stairs.

Elaine figured she and Touma were probably in the way since the metal stairs were pretty narrow. "Umm," she gestured behind Touma, about to suggest that they should come the rest of the way up, but didn't get the chance. Touma turned back just in time to be cuffed on the ear, and any words Elaine had planned came out more as a gasp.

* * *

Author's note: You may have noticed Touma refers to Elaine with the name Ms. Suzuki after reading Sonoko's name badge. From there you might have inferred that Sonoko is not yet married in this story. However, although the story is written in English, it is understood that the characters are speaking in Japanese (unless otherwise stated). In Japanese, the honorific Touma more than likely would have used there was -sama, (as he is, somewhat mockingly, being respectful) which unlike its English equivalent is gender-neutral and doesn't change depending on a person's marital status. Further, even if you were ruling out the cultural differences in honorifics he uses her Maiden name; Suzuki which also might have made you think she wasn't yet married. Which okay fair, that's a possibility. However, since Sonoko comes from a very affluent family whose family name is deeply tied to their business interests, it wouldn't be unheard of for her to keep her family name [Her sister, who is married in canon, goes by Suzuki instead of her husband's last name; and her sister's husband still goes by his father's last name.], or even for Sonoko's husband to take her last name as well. This might even be the more likely option as to my knowledge, the current generation of the Suzuki family has no male heir to inherit the Suzuki name or financial group, and there is some precedent for affluent families adopting in their daughter's husbands so they can inherit the families assets and take over businesses in Japan. Regardless, whether Sonoko is married by this point in the story or not, she is going by the last name Suzuki. All this is to say that it could go either way because unlike the marital status of certain other characters in this story, Sonoko's is not plot-relevant. Now the real question here, did I spend way too much time fussing over the implications of a detail I confess has relatively little relevance to the overall plot? Yes, yes I did. Is that what took me so long to post these three chapters? No, that would be chapter 5.


End file.
